Big data analytics add value find surveys
By Retail Technology | Wednesday July 17 2013
Two retailer and consumer product manufacturers studies from around world suggest analytics positively improve stock price
A pair of new studies released by IBM Retail reveal that suggests big data analytics is helping the stock prices of top retailers and consumer packaged goods (CPG) companies to outperform their competitors.
Conducted among nearly 700 senior CPG sales and retail merchandising executives from Australia, Canada, India, UK and US across the two studies, the most successful are growing share value by applying analytics to better understand consumers and adjust to their needs.
According to the new Kantar Retail Global CPG Study of over 350 top CPG executives, 74% use data analytics to improve decision making in sales compared to just 37% of lower performing CPGs. The number of CPG companies that plan to focus more on the end consumer will rise significantly from 28% to 49% in the next three years.
Having the right data to analyse
The new other new study of 325 senior retail merchandising executives, conducted by IBM Centre for Applied Insights in conjunction with Planet Retail, found 65% of retail merchandisers feel big data analytics is critical to their business compared to just 38% of other retail companies.
Nearly two thirds (63%) of top retail merchandisers said they have the data they need to conduct meaningful analytics while 33 of other retailers did not. And 83% of leading retail merchandisers were focusing more on the consumer, compared to just 47% of their lower performing counterparts.
The Kantar research also found that the stock prices of top CPG organisations grew 60% faster than their chasing counterparts over the last three years. Similarly, the stock price of top retailers rose three times faster than the laggards.
Big data builds industry collaboration
The report suggested this successful consumer focus may cause a power struggle between CPG companies and retailers for ultimate influence over the consumer. But it urged that, by placing a higher importance on collaboration between internal and external stakeholders, they could work together to drive shared business results and get the most out of their analytics investment.
Over two thirds (69%) of the marketing departments of top retail merchandisers were highly collaborative versus 39% of other retailers, while 44% of leading CPG companies reported a ‘robust partnership’ between marketing, sales and IT versus only 20% of their competitors.
Jay Henderson, IBM Smarter Commerce strategy programme director, stated: “Leading retailers and consumer packaged goods suppliers are increasingly looking to the consumer to inform better business strategies. By using data analytics, these top performers are more in tune with retail trends that turn market opportunity into market leadership.”
The full results of the IBM/Kantar Retail Global CPG study and the retail merchandising study conducted by IBM Centre for Applied Insights and Planet Retail are available to download.
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